


Poor Maintenance Practices

by Mirdala



Category: gen:LOCK (Web Series)
Genre: Canon Temporary Character Death, Gen, Heavy Angst, I needed to fill in some blanks, Made up Vanguard members, focus on the aircraft maintenance, grieving friend, loss of a best friend, loss of a loved one, very sad, wrath of a kind man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-11-05 06:57:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17913998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mirdala/pseuds/Mirdala
Summary: Miguel knows one thing as an engineer and maintainer of the Striders, Chase should have been able to eject.





	Poor Maintenance Practices

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SaltCore](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SaltCore/gifts).



> Cuz as an aircraft mechanic I had some feelings about Chase not being able to eject.

It’s been 12-on, 12-off, around the clock after the attack on New York for everyone at the Vanguard. The maintenance crews were sleeping and eating whenever they could. In the limited down time they had to catch their breaths, Miguel was hunting through maintenance records, AIRCRAFT: INTERCEPTOR 2 - DESIGNATION: CHASER in large letters on the window pulled in front of his eyes. It wouldn’t take him long to find what he was looking for,  he just had to find the time to look, and he finally had it. 

He scrolled through the preflight book, the listed maintenance action forms completed in the last month. He dove into the systems worked on by various shops in the past week. He checked the upcoming inspections schedule and the engine and aircraft hours. He checked technical directives for altered maintenance practices or parts being recalled. 

Nothing. 

With a deep inhale he opened the last daily inspection performed on Chase’s plane by all of the maintenance shops. 

POWERPLANTS - INSPECTED BY: ALSTON

AIRFRAME - INSPECTED BY: LANDIS

AVIONICS - INSPECTED BY: COOPER

COMNAV - INSPECTED BY: PENADO

SAFETY&SUR - INSPECTED BY: BLANKENSHIP

Miguel swiped the windows away, hopping off the maintenance stand he sat on.  

“Garza, where are you going? This Strider still needs--GARZA!” Miguel ignores the call that follows him out of the hangar bay as he heads into part of the base housing the maintenance workcenters. His boots striking the floor herald his approach. Miranda, Leon, Jodie and other Strider pilots look up, exhaustion and grief scarred into their faces. Miguel passes with only a glance in their direction. 

“Miguel?” 

He didn’t stop when Miranda utters his name, he keeps going until he reaches a door with the designation of ‘V-183 S & S’ above it. The door sighed open. Like most workcenters, given the circumstances, it’s chaos. Any counter space or tables are covered with parts and tools. Half eaten food mingles in between the equipment, left behind from workers with limited time to eat. Workers are bustling about, checking out tool boxes and manuals for jobs to complete, running over lists of needed parts, a few finding a moment to throw their visors over their eyes and catch a quick nap. Collateral duty inspectors and workcenter supervisors have their heads bent together to figure out how to get everything done with the limited number of workers they have to deal with the heavy workload.

They don’t notice Miguel standing in the doorway, reading each and every person’s name patch on their chest. He isn’t part of the V-138 maintenance department. He doesn’t know everyone’s face and voice like he knows those in his own. Doesn’t take long to find who he’s looking for. 

He walks in, not noticing the puzzled looks as to why a Strider engineer is in their workcenter. As the distance closes between him and his goal, his vision tunnels and everything goes red.

Blankenship doesn’t see the fist coming to their face until it's too late. 

“¡PEDAZO DE MIERDA!” The workcenter erupts. Miguel swings his fists nonstop, hitting any part of Blankenship’s body. 

“MIGUEL!” The Strider pilots had followed then piled in trying to diffuse the situation. They, together with the workers in the shop, pull Miguel off Blankenship.

“YOU BASTARD!” He kicks his feet out when he’s pulled away trying to continue his assault.

“Miguel what the hell are you doing! This isn’t time to be--” Leon is in his face scowling at him and his complete flip in personality while he struggles to break free from the holds on him. He wasn’t the Miguel everyone was used to seeing. He wasn’t the easy going, good natured engineer right now. He was a man taken over by his grief and anger. 

“The last transmission from Chase’s bird was an error for the ejection system.” The words are ground out between his clenched teeth, body held in place by Jodie and Williams at his sides. 

The information stunts everyone just enough for Miguel to lunge, trying to throw off the two holding him back from taking his pain out on the only person he could hold responsible. “HE KILLED CHASE! CHASE COULDN’T EJECT BECAUSE THIS PIECE OF SHIT DIDN’T DO HIS GODDAMN JOB!”

Leon swiftly steps into place blocking his path. “You don’t know that Miguel. You don’t--” 

“Don’t know that it wasn’t complacency? That on a day where an attack wasn’t supposed to happen, when Chase’s plane wasn’t scheduled for flying, someone might not be as thorough as possible on their daily inspection because it's just another fucking day!?” 

There wouldn’t be an investigation to ever answer the reason why the ejection system malfunctioned. Not with the Union pressing hard and fast. No personnel would be or even could be spared to look into the matter. Not when they couldn’t even recover Chase’s body. But Miguel did his due diligence, leaving him with the most plausible reason why he’d never get that game of Siege with Chase.

Complacency leading to poor maintenance practices.

Familiarity costing someone their life. A constant battle against the mind numbing after doing a routine inspect day after day, week after week. Shortcuts made in blind faith of the machine’s integrity, the reliability of the secondary systems in place. Every maintainer’s nightmare, their negligence killing one of their own. A comrade. A friend. Theirs or someone else’s. Knowing they were the reason why someone would be told their child was dead, for a coffin draped in a flag to be folded and presented. 

It hit so close to home for Miguel, an engineer for the Striders with his own pilots’ lives in his hands. He knows he and the rest of the workers in the room had gone to the same safety briefs, been through the same training, drilled again and again about doing their job properly and yet…. Knowing all this, ground salt into the all too fresh wound left by Chase’s death. 

“Chase--is gone,” Miguel chokes on the words and sags, his tears don’t soften his angered features, “because he didn’t do his fucking inspection properly. My best friend is  _ dead _ .” 

“He trusted you.” She finally says, cutting everyone off from their rebuttals, reminding them of the bond between a pilot and maintainer. Every pilot knows any flight could be their last. A reality they are prepared for when they start their pre-flight checklist. Every pilot trusting with all they have in the maintainers of their aircraft to do their jobs, so they can head into the skies focuses on their mission. And come back home at the end of it.

Everyone in the room knows the price of their work done poorly, now they see the aftermath it first hand, why they were held to such high standards. Miguel known for always being good natured, now fighting against his own pilots to keep him from continuing his violence and Miranda standing stock still, tears running down her blank face, the raw pain wrought by the inattention by a single person on a single day of a single aircraft system.

Few can barely look at the sight casting their gaze to their boots instead. There’s nothing left to say. There are no words of comfort or apologies to give. No reassurances that it’ll never happen again because it already happened once. There was just the bitter reality of the situation.

So the Strider pilots turn away, taking their grieving members with them, the door hissing closed behind them.


End file.
